Chapter 24 - The significance for unconventional petroleum exploration of a good classification system for gravity-flow deposits, with examples from the Yanchang Formation

Abstract

Research into transport and deposition mechanisms of fine-grained mass-flow deposits is hampered by the absence of an easily applicable classification scheme. We propose here such a scheme on the basis of the mud content in combination with the presumed transport mechanism. The scheme comprises 12 types of gravity-flow deposits. The practical applicability of this classification is shown for the Triassic lacustrine Yanchang Formation in the Southern Ordos Basin (China). This formation contains abundant slump deposits, debrites, turbidites, and hyperpycnites.